The 19-year-old from Spring, Texas, and UCLA delivered team-high scores on vault (15.933), balance beam (15.300) and floor exercise (15.800) and showed a level of gymnastics that far exceeds anyone else in the world.
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There had been no question that the United States would triumph, after finishing ahead in the qualification round by an unusually high margin of almost 10 points on their closest competitor. But don’t let that make you think these women are not some of the world’s greatest athletes. The team event starts at 3 p.m. on the East Coast of the US – 4 p.m.in Brazil — and is expected to last around two hours. From a five-woman squad, each nation picks three gymnasts to compete on the four apparatus.
Maybe that’s because for Hernandez, Biles, Gabby Douglas, Madison Kocian and Aly Raisman, the meets are the fun part of their jobs.
For Gabby Douglas, today’s team finals are almost the end of the road. So Karolyi’s strategy worked – not that it really mattered, considering the way Simone Biles, Aly Raisman and Laurie Hernandez performed in the other events. Douglas nails her landing off the bars and bounces off the landing pad, all smiles.
Biles is expected to dominate individual competition the rest of the Olympics, favored to win not just all-around gold but take first on three apparatus competitions.
Biles was the American anchor, the only member to perform in all four disciplines, batting clean up on three of them. She delivered beautifully, getting great extension on a hard routine.
Note: Watching this live, we do not have the benefit of hearing highly knowledgeable gymnastics analysts tell us what all these contortions and flips are, so we’re focused on describing what’s going on.
After watching the Chinese athletes perform their routines on the uneven bars, the USA squad is finally called. They finished with Hernandez, Raisman and Biles delivering high-flying, engaging floor routines.
The Americans take turns warming up on the bars, running through their routines.
Yet it’s not just enough for Karolyi for her team to win.
The arena is quite loud at times with cheering – particularly for the Brazilian team that’s concurrently competing on the floor exercise.
A fall from Elissa Downie on the beam proved costly for Britain, though, as they dropped back to fifth at the halfway point. The Chinese gymnasts are dressed in purple leotards with rows of glittering silver – an effect that’s echoed in their glittery eye makeup.
Their lead now almost five points, the US women finished with the floor exercise. That didn’t mean it couldn’t be the flawless ending for what had been an nearly ideal two days of competition, the crowd clapping in unison along with Hernandez’s music, then chanting “U-S-A!” after Raisman hit – gloriously – sticking her final tumbling pass.
Next up: the uneven bars.
Final scores are now in for the vault; the US scored a 46.866 – more than 2 points above the 44.332 for the Chinese gymnasts. There are no penalties on her score.
“It doesn’t feel real”, said Raisman, who was winning a second consecutive team gold alongside Douglas.
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Hernandez, though scored a slight fraction of a point lower (15.233), was a special delight to watch – so stylish in her movement, so committed to each tumbling pass and pose.
